Infection control guidelines for the prevention of transmission of infectious diseases in the health care setting

A print friendly PDF version is available from this Communicable Diseases Intelligence issue's table of contents.

The January 2004 edition of the Infection Control Guidelines for the Prevention of Transmission of Infectious Diseases in the Health Care Setting (ICG), was recently endorsed by the Australian Health Minister's Advisory Council.

The electronic version of this document is now available for downloading from http://www1.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/content/icg-guidelines-index.htm. A limited number of hard copy folders of the document will be distributed nationally to public and private hospitals, aged care facilities, peak health organisations, key staff in state and territory health departments, health libraries and universities, in mid to late June 2004.

The Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing has prepared these guidelines under the auspices of the Communicable Diseases Network Australia, which is a subcommittee of the National Public Health Partnership. The National Health and Medical Research Council's Special Expert Committee on Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies has also endorsed the Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) component of the ICG.

This document replaces the Infection control in the health care setting-guidelines for the prevention of transmission of infectious diseases,¹ and incorporates guidelines on patient management and infection control relating to CJD and other human transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (thus replacing Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease and Other Human Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies: Guidelines on Patient Management and Infection Control.²

These guidelines are a reference document providing current 'best practice' national guidelines for infection control procedures in Australian health care settings, and should be considered in association with state and territory legislative requirements that affect work practices of the health care establishment and/or health care worker. (Note: if the recommendations in this document conflict with state or territory guidelines, the statutory requirements of the state or territory take precedence.

References

1. National Health and Medical Research Council. Infection control in the health care setting-guidelines for the prevention of transmission of infectious diseases. National Health and Medical Research Council, Canberra; 1996.

2. National Health and Medical Research Council. Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease and Other Human Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies: Guidelines on Patient Management and Infection Control National Health and Medical Research Council, Canberra; 1995.

This article was published in Communicable Diseases Intelligence Vol 28 No 2, June 2004.